Chapter 413: Cheating
Leaving the paratrooper training base and returning to the palace, Foreign Minister Ribbentrop came to report that Britain was going to send a special envoy to discuss peace talks.
"It seems that the effect of mines is quite good." Nearly 4,000 mines have been laid in the waters around Britain these days. Yannick received intelligence that the newly completed battleship Prince of Wales was hit by a mine when a British fleet left the port last night. As a result, the remaining warships did not dare to move forward and had to retreat to the port. The British army was working hard to clear mines, but they obviously did not realize that the Germans laid new mines and were still using the old minesweeping method to clear mines.
In fact, once the principle of this magnetic mine is discovered, it is easy to deal with. Just let two minesweepers sail in parallel, with a long cable dragged at the stern. Let the current pass through the cable to create a magnetic field between the two ships, which will detonate the nearby magnetic mines.
This method was developed by Charles Goode, deputy director of the British Admiralty's Multi-Weapon Research and Development Department.
This guy was a "disaster" to Germany. Not only did he develop this minesweeping method, he also came up with a method of "wiping ships" to make them unaffected by magnetic mines. After the ship was wiped, everything from small boats to large ships could pass through the magnetic minefield unimpeded. But he also found that the changed magnetic field would gradually be restored by the vibration of the engine and the impact of the waves, which meant that the ship had to be "wiped" again every six months.
Gudif coined a new word for this process, called "demagnetization"; this word is a tribute to Carl Friedrich Gauss, who was the first person to calibrate the magnetic field, and the word rhymes with the word "delousing" in English. In the Dunkirk evacuation battle in the original time and space, it was relying on his "demagnetization" method that more than 400 ships of various sizes were demagnetized in just three days. In the days that followed, another 1,000 ships were "wiped". This operation, combined with the above-mentioned minesweeping method, made British ships surprisingly safe when encountering magnetic mines throughout the evacuation process. The miracle of Dunkirk was largely due to Charles Goodeve and his research results.
He did not stop there, and led his team to develop the anti-submarine weapon "Hedgehog Bomb".
At that time, the British Army had an emergency anti-tank mortar called the Black Grenadier, which was designed with a plug-in rod and was intended to be used against German tanks that landed.
The so-called plug-in rod mortar has no barrel, but only a launching rod on the gun mount. The tail tube of the shell is sleeved on the launching rod for orientation, and the propellant is installed at the head of the tail tube. After ignition, it pushes the shell away from the launching rod. So when the hedgehog bomb is not loaded, the launcher is a lot of rods extending in different directions, which looks like a hedgehog. This is why this weapon got its name.
Goodeve's team combined 24 launching rods together. By adjusting the angle of the launching rod and controlling the firing order of each launching rod with an ignition circuit, 24 hedgehog bombs will fly more than 200 yards and fall at the same time, and are arranged in a circle with a diameter of 30 meters or an ellipse of 30X40 meters. As long as the submarine is surrounded, it is destined to be hit by multiple hedgehog bombs at the same time, and it is absolutely difficult to escape.
The caliber of the hedgehog bomb is 178 mm, the range is 200-259 meters, and it is loaded with 13 kg of TNT explosives, which can blow a half-meter to one-meter hole in the submarine's pressure hull. Later, it was changed to load 16 kg of Topex underwater explosives for torpedoes, which is more powerful. It uses a double fuze. When it hits the sea surface, it releases the insurance and enters the standby state. When it hits the submarine, the second fuze is detonated. The shock wave of the close-range explosion can also activate this fuze, so it often causes large-scale chain explosions, adding additional damage to the submarine. The sinking speed of the hedgehog bomb after entering the water is 3 times faster than that of the depth charge. It only takes 9 seconds to reach a depth of 61 meters, leaving very limited time for the submarine to escape. The hedgehog bomb has much less charge than the depth charge, so the explosion sound is also small, which does not affect the sonar work. The loading can be completed three minutes after the launch, and the anti-submarine ship can launch continuous attacks.
Later, the Americans also installed the same weapon, which played a positive role in the anti-submarine warfare in the Atlantic.
Yannick certainly wouldn't keep such a guy, and sent someone to deal with him a few years ago. Now Yannick didn't know when the British would be able to develop a way to counter magnetic mines.
"The British want to negotiate, so to show their sincerity, they have to pay the "negotiation fee" first. If they don't pay, they just want to fool us. I don't want much, 50 tons of gold, or hand over the Glorious aircraft carrier to us, then we can talk. Just reply to the British, this price is not negotiable." Yannick muttered after Ribbentrop left. "If you want to trick me, then I will trick you too."
That night, Spanish Deputy Head of State Salazar secretly visited Samuel Hall, the British ambassador to Madrid.
"What is your business so late, Mr. Deputy Head of State?" Hall said unhappily.
He really hated this greedy guy now. Last time, the British Empire spent 270 tons of gold in vain, but it didn't work. The Soviet army has not been able to break through the Finnish army's defense line until now.
Salazar said in a low voice with a mysterious look on his face. "I came here this time to tell your country a big secret, a big secret that determines the fate of Germany."
"What secret?!" Hall almost blurted out.
But Salazar didn't continue to talk, and smoked a cigar leisurely.
Hall gritted his teeth. "Mr. Deputy Head of State, please name a price."
Salazar silently stretched out two fingers, and Hall's heart jumped suddenly, and a faint feeling of uneasiness surged in his heart. "Two tons of gold?"
Salazar tutted his tongue twice. "When did Mr. Hall become so stingy? It's 200 tons, 200 tons of gold!"
"!!" Hall was furious and wanted to slam the table and drive him away; only to hear Salazar continue. "Mr. Hall should also know that 'the greater the risk, the higher the return'; I am now taking the risk of the whole of Spain and Germany being enemies. If Mr. Hall is not interested, just pretend I have never been here. But I can tell you that this secret has a chance to reverse the current situation." After saying that, he stood up and was about to leave.
Hall hurriedly stopped him. "Mr. Deputy Head of State, please stay, I will go to London for instructions."
Churchill, who was so angry about Yannick's so-called "peace negotiation fee", almost fainted when he heard the news from the ambassador to Spain.
These people treat the British Empire as an ATM? !
However, he is very interested in the secret mentioned by the Spanish Deputy Head of State. "What do you think the secret is?"
Eden couldn't help but smile bitterly. If he could think of it, would it still be called a secret? "Although Salazar is greedy, he does take money to do things. Like last time, Spain did withdraw the volunteers." It's just that the price paid by the British Empire is a bit high, and the effect is not very good.
"Is there a chance to reverse the current situation?" Churchill fell into deep thought. It was not until the cigar butt between his fingers was about to burn that he came to his senses and gritted his teeth. "Agree to this deal. I hope what he said is true, otherwise I will never let him go!"